Y’all. I have a confession to make. I haven’t been entirely honest. I’ve been hiding a dirty little secret from you.

All of the blog posts you’ve been seeing? The social media postings?

I wasn’t posting them.

I have a secret.

More like a SECRET WEAPON!!!!

Did y’all start paying attention? Move closer to your computer screen ready for some juicy drama about not being honest? Are you bummed now that I don’t have crazy confessions? Don’t be, because I’m about to change your freaking lives. Stay close to that computer screen, and pay attention.

CoSchedule.com is My Blogging Bestie

CoSchedule has been dropping my blog posts like they’re hot, and they’ve also been all over my social media. I set it up like that. Our amazing client Sam at Hygge Wellness turned me on to this scandalously wonderful service. I would never be able to do ALL THE THINGS without this.

Let me ask you a question, or a bajillion.

Do you have a business?

Do you want to blog, successfully?

Do you struggle with timing and scheduling?

Are you a visual person?

Have you felt like you need to hire someone to cover your social media accounts for your blog and/or business?

Do you need an editorial calendar to make your blog hopes & dreams come true?

Do you want your blogging journey to be EASIER?

Are you pressed for time?

You need CoSchedule, then. It’s the solution to all of those questions, and then some. I’m not even kidding, y’all.

How I Use CoSchedule

I won’t lie — the idea of learning how to use CoSchedule was so daunting at first, but I knew that once I did, I’d be thrilled with it. There was something magical about the promise of having your blog posts be automated and have your social media posts scheduled to go. I watched a series of videos to learn about CoSchedule, and then got to work. One of the cool features about CoSchedule is that you can use your WordPress dashboard OR the CoSchedule website in order to draft, schedule, & publish your posts. The integration is flawless. I prefer to use it through WordPress, since I also manage a store on my website, too.

So, here’s the deal, y’all.

The Editorial Calendar

This handy tool lays out a calendar for you. You can fill your calendar with blog posts scheduled to drop, social media posts scheduled to drop, events, promotion on social media independent of your blog-related postings, and tasks. You can schedule things far in advance, too. This is great, because as a blogger, you should have at least three months of posts or drafts in your queue so that you never run out of material and are always working ahead. You can draft your post, schedule it, and then schedule your social media postings for the same blog post. If you aren’t entirely certain you want to post it yet, you just save it as a draft within the CoSchedule app.

When I got started with CoSchedule, I had 40+ blog post drafts hanging out in WordPress. I knew I could schedule them within WordPress, but it still left me with an icky task — social media. Let’s face it — your posts, unless you’re a magician, won’t go anywhere unless you put them there, so social media is a must. With a business to run, it seemed totally tedious to go to each of my social accounts to share a post. It seemed even more tedious to re-share those things at a later date to keep my blog fresh in everyone’s mind.

Depending on your account type, you can add multiple authors to your account. If you’re a larger company, or a blog/news website that has multiple writers, this is especially handy for assigning tasks and topics to your team. You can modify the calendar and the labels to be different colors, too, to distinguish one person from another.

This is what my editorial calendar looks like these days — seriously, it’s so easy to schedule everything with this calendar.

The Drafts Bin

Once I learned about how to use CoSchedule, I realized all of my drafts were saved in my drafts bin. All I needed to do was drag the draft onto my calendar. Bam!! It was there. (Make sure, if you’ve saved as a draft, that you go in and actually click the “schedule” button.) I also thought it was pretty nifty that I could draft posts around on my calendar, too. Suddenly, this terrible feeling that I was unprepared to launch a blog lifted. As I began scheduling my posts, I realized that I had A LOT more content than I expected. I started moving all of these posts that were 99% done to my calendar and filling my drafts bin with more ideas.

Social Media

This. THIS is the best thing, for real. The folks at CoSchedule are amazing for doing this. Not only can you schedule your post to be dropped on major social media networks (Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram), but you can schedule MULTIPLE posts. Based on some epic social media info, CoSchedule recommends that you schedule your social media posts to drop on the same day your blog post goes live, the next day for some social media, a week after the initial post, and then a month later to remind people that you posted about this thing. The greatest thing is that ALL of the scheduling stuff is contained within this really easy to use set-up — accessed through both your calendar, AND through your draft if you scroll down. Two ways to access it. Genius.

It gets better, though. They give you the option to post it in specific windows of time, OR to select the best/recommended time to post which will get you the most views and traffic. Are you kidding?!

This is an example of what the social media scheduling looks like within the CoSchedule app on WordPress.

For Facebook, Twitter, & Pinterest, the post is automatic — not a single thing you have to do in order to make it happen once you schedule it. For Instagram, CoSchedule has an awesome app that you can install on your mobile. When you allow the push notifications, it’ll notify you that it’s time to post to Instagram and help you copy the image/info to share with your followers! When I post to Instagram from the CoSchedule app, it doesn’t take me more than 30 seconds to a minute to get it done. It’s basically foolproof.

Various levels of a CoSchedule subscription will grant you access to analytics associated with your blog & social media postings. It’s also worth mentioning — even though I don’t use them — Google Plus, Tumblr, and LinkedIn are also networks that you can link up with your CoSchedule account. You can also integrate your Buffer account, too.

The Verdict

I didn’t know how CoSchedule was going to pan out for me. Admittedly, I’m usually a bit skeptical of companies and things that promise to make things easier, and I wouldn’t sit here and toot the CoSchedule horn if I didn’t mean it. This will be one of the greatest investments you can make for your blog or your business. Whenever I realized I needed to transfer my CoSchedule account from BeckMcCormick.com over to Autumn Lane Paperie, all I had to do was submit a message — the team at CoSchedule reached out to me within the hour, and had me totally transferred by the next day. The transition was seamless, and the level of care they give their customers…stellar.

Bloggers

For a person that wants to blog, successfully, either by gaining a ton of readers or monetizing, you have to be consistent and let people know you’re there. You could sponsor ads all day long on the various forms of social media, but your money is going to be far more well-spent developing a game plan by using CoSchedule. Not only will you be able to schedule your posts and be motivated to fill in empty spots on your editorial calendar, but they take all of the heavy lifting out of the social media side of blogging.

Businesses

Your blog is a totally crucial part of your website, if you’re a business. It makes your SEO game that much better. It also improves your credibility and status — whether you’re active, inactive, etc. The blog part of a business, though, always seems to fall by the wayside. Either you don’t know what to blog about, don’t have enough time, or don’t see any results for the amount of time you put in. This will help you. Immensely.

Gift Yourself

If you don’t do this today, you’ll regret it. I’m not even lying. I’ve told so many of my friends & clients about CoSchedule since I learned about it. It has given me a successful launch, and has also helped me be consistent with my postings and social messages. I’m a visual person, too, so seeing the editorial calendar with my scheduled posts, social messages, and empty days has allowed me to plan better for the best chance of success for my blog. Social media is MUCH less daunting with this blog than I expected it would be since I have CoSchedule on my side. I barely even have to think about it. It’s easier, and has been SUCH a time saver. I can’t even begin to tell you the hours & hours of time CoSchedule has saved me.

When I touched base with some of my followers, one of the things that they mentioned was that they struggled to juggle everything. I hear y’all. Running a business is tough all on its own. When you factor in family, friends, chores, school, and for some, even a full time job, it’s insane! One of the things that I swear by is meal planning. So, I made this for you to make it easy, and stylish. See?

Hear me out on this, y’all. I know, I know. Everyone and their brother on Pinterest is into meal planning. Momblogs detail, in depth, what they do for meal planning. Lifestyle blogs detail this stuff, too. Health blogs swear by it. Some people have binders, folders, and more for their meal planning. Sure, I’m jumping on the bandwagon. I swear by it, even though I don’t always meal plan.

You know what happens when I don’t meal plan, though? INSANITY. Ok, not really, but dinner is way more difficult. I get up in the morning, get to work, and work all day long. Jeff does, too. (Random interjection: Man, I love when he cooks! Isn’t it always better when someone else does it?!) Whenever meal time rolls around, and neither my hubby or I can figure out what we want to cook, we get stuck. Sometimes, we make crappy junk for dinner, or sometimes we visit the amazing Mexican restaurant next door.

One thing is for sure, though. When we don’t know what we’re eating for dinner, we definitely don’t go for our vegetable drawer to make a salad. It always winds up being something less than healthy, which begins to have a pretty negative effect… Or positive effect on your waistline, if you know what I mean.

I used to have a meal planning section in my previous Limelife Planner, but since my new planner is a lot larger than my previous, I opted to leave out the meal planning bit. (Side note: I would totally recommend the meal planning add-on; I just can’t/don’t want to carry my giant 8.5×11 planner with me in the store.)

A Sweet Freebie for You!

So, I decided that I’d design my own meal planning print-out. It’s been such a huge help over the last few months. I actually open this printable on my iPad, and fill it out using the Procreate app, send it to my printer, and BOOM! I have a plan for dinner, and a grocery list.

It’s been a huge timesaver for us, and I’ve enjoyed cooking a lot more these days. The worst part about cooking (which I love, by the way) is deciding *what* to cook with what you have on hand. This solves the problem for me. I usually clip off the grocery list portion to take to the store with me, and then post daily menu on our bulletin board.

I usually do the meal planning on my own, asking for a bit of input before I start. Autumn has helped me on occasion, though. Sometimes, I even build in a day or two for her to cook dinner for us, too. One thing that is worth noting is to build in a day for leftovers! This might not be needed for some families, but if you have a habit of poorly estimating the amount of food you’re cooking (me!), a leftover day is a must!